NEW DELHI: Close on the heels of acquiring 49% stake in Guru Gobind Singh Refineries' Bhatinda refinery, a joint venture between Hindustan Petroleum Corp (HPCL) and Mittal Investments, India-born billionaire Lakshmi N Mittal is eyeing a stake in two more new refineries being set up at Bina in Madhya Pradesh and Vishakhapatnam in Andhra Pradesh.Mittal is in talks to take 20% stake in state-run Bharat Petroleum Corp's Rs 9,100-crore, six-million-tonne a year Bina refinery that is to be commissioned by 2010-11, industry sources said.

The steel tycoon is also talking to HPCL for a stake in its proposed greenfield nine-million-tonne refinery-cum-petrochemical complex at Vishakhapatnam.HPCL itself is talking to France's Total, state-run gas firm Gail (India) and explorer Oil India for a possible four-way partnership in the Rs 25,000-30,000 crore project."Total was already talking to HPCL for a stake in the state-run firm's planned doubling of capacity of the existing refinery at Vizag to 15 million tonne.

HPCL, it seems, has abandoned the Vizag expansion and is now planning the new refinery-cum-petrochemical complex in the country's first petroleum, chemical and petrochemical investment region (PCPIR)," a source said.The Rs 18,919 crore Bhatinda refineries is scheduled to be commissioned by 2011.